4. Claude "vibecoding"
In this assignment you will create a working computer game based on your assigned fiction. Or rather, you will have Claude create one for you. You don’t have to know anything about how coding works - you just have to feel the “vibe”.
First, think about what sort of game you’d like to make. I have some suggestions below for each piece of fiction, but feel free to come up with other ideas. If you’re really stuck for ideas (or if the idea you’re working on just isn’t coming together) you could do a text-based adventure game, or a point-and-click walking simulator, or a version of Tetris that uses visual elements from your story. You aren’t going to be able to make something that uses modern graphics or especially fast-paced action, but you can probably make something like one level of a classic 1980s video game.
Start a new chat window in Claude and describe the type of game you’d like to make. If it’s not familiar with your fiction, you might upload the text. Claude might have suggestions about how to make the game feasible, or might be able to help you brainstorm additions to the game or alternate versions of it. It might ask you some questions, or might just get started coding. Once it’s going, it could take a couple minutes - you might want to do something else, and tell Claude to notify you when it’s ready for you to check.
When it gives you something, tell Claude what you want to make it better. Maybe it’s unclear how to even get it started - you can ask Claude to explain. Look at the interface - does the program have all the buttons you want it to have? Does it have any buttons that it shouldn’t have? Do you like the colors or the fonts or the way it’s displayed? Do things move too fast or slow? Would you like to change how things are organized, or how you interact with it? Tell Claude how you’d like that changed and see if you can get it to look the way you want.
You might run into usage limits while you’re doing this - in that case, you can either wait 5 hours until it resets, or you can download the html file it has made so far (“download” might be hidden behind the three dots in the upper right corner), create a new free account (maybe using a new throwaway e-mail), and start a new chat, uploading the html file from before, and explaining what you were trying to get it to do.
Before you submit the final version, consider if a random student looking at this program will know what it is and how to use it - if there’s some explanation that would be good to include, tell Claude what that explanation is, and either have it display it on the screen, or pop up in an info button, or something else.
Once you’re done, click the “Publish” button at the top, and copy the link it provides to the working program, and submit it here. (Note that if you make any changes after this, the link still goes to the old one, so select “Publish” on the final version.) If you don’t see the “Public” button, then you might look under the three dots and see if there is “Save as Artifact” - once you’ve done that, it should appear on the right side of the screen, and that version should then have “Publish” as an option under the three dots.
Some ideas for a game based on each fiction
Feel free to come up with any idea of your own, or let Claude do some brainstorming (but don’t be afraid to criticize Claude if the ideas it comes up with don’t make any sense!):
- The Sorcerer’s Apprentice: The player needs to fill the cauldron before the time limit. They have buttons to create animated brooms that help them fill it faster. If the cauldron starts overflowing, then now they have to stop the brooms before it gets too far. Or maybe the player plays from the perspective of the brooms, or of the sorcerer?
- Maelzel’s Chess Player: Maybe it’s a chess simulator, but from the perspective of the player inside the device, who can’t see the board clearly? Or maybe the player takes Poe’s perspective, and tries to identify which of several chess players is secretly a robot?
- The Machine Stops: Maybe the player is Vashti, trying to write a lecture, but dealing with calls from Kuno? Or maybe it’s a platformer where Kuno is trying to escape at the end? Or maybe the player is steering the airship?
- A Logic Named Joe: Maybe it’s an interactive adventure game where the main character of the story is trying to find Joe but getting distracted by Laurine? Or maybe the player is a kid trying to use Joe to find some forbidden knowledge? Or maybe the player is Joe, trying to cause chaos?
- The Great Automatic Grammatizator: Maybe it’s a text-based adventure where you interact with authors and try to talk them into using your machine. Or maybe it’s an interactive version of the device, that generates stories with the pre-selector buttons and organ stops mentioned in the text.
- The Last Question: Maybe the player is trying to upgrade their supercomputer before the entropy of the universe gets too high? Or maybe the supercomputer has to interact with different humans over the eons to gather sufficient data? Or maybe it’s just a space adventure game set in the world of the story?
- Silicon Muse: Maybe the player is trying to carry out the plot suggested by the computer at the end of the story. Or maybe the player is the computer, generating stories? Or maybe it’s just a text adventure where you interact with the other professors, trying to convince them to fund your grant?
- Learning to Be Me: Maybe the player occupies the perspective of the jewel, trying to learn to predict the behavior of the person. Or maybe the player is trying to guess which other humans around them have made the switch.
- Cat Pictures Please: Maybe the player is interacting with various humans, and has background knowledge about all of them, and has different options for how to try to help them, and keeps score with how many cat pictures they receive? Or maybe the player takes the perspective of one of the humans in the story?
- Slaughterbots: Maybe this is a platformer where the player is trying to avoid getting slaughtered. Or maybe it’s a first-person shooter where the player is a slaughterbot trying to find its target.
- Zima Blue: Maybe this is a meditative interaction where the player just tries to paint everything blue. Or maybe the player takes the perspective of the journalist, trying to find out Zima’s past. Or maybe the player takes the perspective of Zima, as he progresses through his life.
- Metropolis: Maybe the player is Maria trying to save the workers. Or maybe the player is the Maschinenmensch, trying to do the dance in the nightclub, or trying to incite the worker uprising. Or maybe the player is a worker, or Frederson, trying to operate the machine.
- The Stepford Wives: Maybe the game follows Joanna sneaking around the Men’s Club to discover the secrets. Or maybe the game follows Joanna trying to figure out what happened to Bobbie. Or maybe the game follows the new woman who moved to town at the end, and the player tries to save her.
- Smart House: Maybe the player is PAT trying to get the family ready for the day. Or maybe the player is a family member trying to escape the house. Or maybe it’s a text adventure where the player tries to negotiate with PAT.
- Her: Maybe this is a dating sim from the perspective of Theodore or Samantha, either trying to win the other’s love, or dating other people. Maybe it’s an abstract adventure following Samantha’s adventures after she leaves at the end. Maybe the player is Theodore trying to write a thoughtful letter at his job.
- Coppélia: Maybe the player is Swan, trying to dance like Coppélia. Or maybe it’s a platformer where she sneaks into the lab to save Franz. Or maybe the game is from the perspective of Coppélius, trying to steal souls.
- Les Contes d’Hoffmann: Maybe the player is Olympia, trying to complete her dance before the clockwork runs down. Or maybe the player is Hoffmann, putting on and taking off the glasses. Or maybe the game focuses on the backstory of the inventors.
- Frankenstein: Maybe the player is Dr. Frankenstein, trying to assemble the pieces of the monster. Or maybe the player is the monster, trying to find acceptance in the world. Or maybe it’s a platformer in the arctic, either as the monster or as Frankenstein.
- Harry Potter: Maybe it’s a text adventure where the Sorting Hat asks questions, and the player is trying to answer them in a way that gets into their favored house. Or maybe the player is the Sorting Hat, and is presented with a sequence of students, with a brief bio, and they have to correctly assign the student to their house. Or maybe it’s a completely unrelated scene from one of the Harry Potter stories.
- The Good Place: Maybe the player is Janet, and when characters ask her for help, she has to decide what objects to provide them. Or maybe it’s the scene where they need to reset Janet, and the player has to overcome her objections. Or maybe there’s some other scene from the show that you think would be fun as a game.
- Detroit: Become Human: Since this one is already a game, you could try to re-create a low-tech version of one of the scenes from the game. Or you could try to do it from the perspective of a different character.